eman.
I've worked for him fifteen years steady. Then the Eastmans came in, and
there was nothing but hurry and drive, grumbling about high wages,
buying cheap wools, and if cloth was poor, blaming the men. Then wages
went down and down, and, when the men stood out, the scum of all the
places around was brought in. Yerbury improved, and beer-saloons
multiplied. Houses were thrown together and sold; and now they're all
falling apart, and standing empty, and half a dozen families are
crowding into one miserable tenement. Who made the money? Was it high
wages that ruined Hope Mills, and wrecked Yerbury Bank?"

"You have hit the truth somewhere, Cameron."

"Those men were thieves and swindlers; and I suppose to-day they're
living on the fat of the land, milk and honey thrown in. See here, I'm
not an educated man, but I have a little common sense. Suppose we'd been
let to go our ways quiet like,--the farmers holding on to their farms,
and making two blades of grass grow where one grew before. Wasn't that
some old philosopher's advice? Suppose David Lawrence hadn't built that
great palace out on Hope Terrace (he was a plainish man himself), and
there had been five or six beside him making a moderate share of money.
He's lost all his great fortune, there's seventy thousand or so gone
somewhere, the bank has smashed with thousands more of everybody's
money, with nothing much to show but trumpery mortgages; there's no work
and no money, and a howl goes up that there has been over-production.
Not over-production of honesty, I take it."

Maverick looked at the little earnest man, and laughed a hearty,
cheering sort of laugh that was like pouring oil into a wound. Jack
stared with wide-open eyes.

"I've been to hear Rantley two or three times,--he's going about
lecturing, you know,--but I don't see as he has any very good plan for
getting work on its legs again. Then I've listened to the parson this
winter, to please the old lady; and he is sure all this is a judgment
for our sins. Seems to me, judgment went a little askew: why doesn't it
touch Eastman and such fellows?"

"Has nothing been done?" asked Jack. "I have heard no business gossip
for the last three months. Can't it be proved that he was a defaulter?"

"Perhaps it could. The old lady was reading the other morning about the
scapegoat being sent into the wilderness with everybody's sins on his
head; and I guess they'd rather have _him_ off somewhere, and pack the
trou